Reconstruction
by Chloe Silvers
Summary: Derek asks Stiles for help in decorating his new loft, hoping that it would get Erica and Boyd to come back. When school starts up again, they go their separate ways and focus on different supernatural emergencies. When Boyd dies, Stiles comes back to help Derek pick up the pieces. Written for 30 Days of Sterek (and bella8876's birthday) Prompt: I can see it in your eyes.


Stiles had just finished bubbling in the last question in his scantron when the alarm clock went off. He put his pencil down and looked down at the page. He wasn't fast enough. He had to pick up the speed in the next couple of months. He needed to do better.

He rubbed his eyes and was about to go into the kitchen for a five minute snack break when he saw Derek Hale just standing there.

"Knocking's still not your style, I get it. What's up?"

"I need your help with something."

Stiles sat back down and took out his laptop, pushing the lid open. "Figured. Human, Animal, or Magical?"

"Human. You can put the computer away. I don't think you have to do much research."

Everything needed research, and if it didn't, what was Derek doing here? He shut off the laptop. "Okay, what have you gotten yourself into?"

"I bought a new place. I think it needs a human touch. Don't know where to begin."

So he needed what? Some form of interior decorator? This was more up Lydia's territory, but Stiles would try.

Stiles could see it now- taking a before and after shot of the place, opening the door and Derek gushing and crying at the sight of it. It's exactly what I wanted! It's beautiful!

Or something like that.

"So you want someone to pick out cushions or help you to give it a paint job?" Stiles asked

"It's different. It'll be easier if I just show you."

Stiles nodded, not giving too much hope for how clean the place would be. Derek did used to live in an abandoned train, and before that, there was the bare-bones minimum of his old burned down house. Stiles wondered just how much of a human touch he could get away with.

They left the house and he got into the passenger seat of Derek's Camaro, curiosity taking over his previous need to ace the SAT.

The new place wasn't in an isolated part of the forest and it wasn't low-key at all. It was a loft on the top floor of a nice building that wasn't in the middle of the town, but wasn't completely secluded either.

The first thing that Stiles noticed was the winding staircase. "What's up there?" Stiles asked

"It's just empty space right now, but there's room for another guest bedroom or maybe some sort of command center."

"How many bedrooms?"

"Three and the master. If the extra one upstairs turns into a bedroom, then it would be four."

He remembered being told that the optimum number in a pack for an Alpha to reach a maximum amount of power is four betas. He looked at the place. It was clean. Stiles couldn't find any peeling paint, the walls looked pretty sturdy, and even though it was plain and completely unfurnished right now, it could be nice once it was fixed up.

It was very un-Derek-like to have a place that was so nice.

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know", Derek admitted. "Maybe a couch, maybe some beds."

The new loft wasn't that far away from some of the local colleges and state universities. And it wasn't too bad of a drive from Stiles' house, and by extension, Scott's house and the high school. Not to mention that it was on the wealthy side of town, so it wasn't far from Jackson's old house or Lydia.

"You think maybe it's unsafe? Having your place not as isolated anymore?"

"If they're looking for me, I want it to be easy to find me."

Stiles wasn't sure who Derek was addressing- the enemies that were always looking to kill him or the parts of his pack that had run away. Was he finally tired of running? Was he giving up? Or was he just desperately looking for a way for his pack to return to him?

Either way, Stiles didn't think that he would get a straight answer from him even if he tried. Derek only gave information that was necessary, he knew that.

Stiles would never have the close relationship with Derek that he had with Scott, but on the other hand, Scott didn't tell Stiles the grand plan to get Gerard out of Beacon Hills. It would have been nice if all parties were clued in on that one. It would have saved Stiles a hell of a lot of panic if he knew that everything was a part of a carefully crafted plan.

And it would have given Derek the opportunity to decide whether or not he wanted to give something that Stiles knew he considered a precious gift to the person who made Kate Argent deranged in the first place. It would have given Derek the chance to contemplate whether or not he wanted to give the bite to a murderer.

Rather than pushing Derek and asking who he was referring to, he nodded. "You're going to have to be a lot more careful with security around here, that's for sure. Especially now that you actually have a door with a lock. I noticed that you don't use it."

He watched Derek look glance over his shoulder to a door. "Yeah, I suppose I'm a little out of practice."

"Human touch, right?" Stiles asked. "That's what you need me for?"

"I don't want anything too out of control. Nothing too flashy." Derek answered

"What's your budget?"

"I don't think you should worry about that."

"Right", Stiles said, giving the place one more glance. "Well, unless werewolves can conjure furniture from nowhere, I think that we should head over to a store or two."

"Now?" Derek asked. "Sure you don't have any other place to be or a website you can pull up?"

"Human touch", Stiles said with a smile. "I'm the human here, right? You driving or do you want to give me your keys?"

Derek rolled his eyes. "I'm regretting this already."

"No."

Stiles looked up at him from the bed. "Come on. Live a little."

"There's no point in having a circular bed."

"Sure there is", Stiles answered cheerfully. "It's your place, you can do whatever you want. You can have a disco ball instead of lights if you really want. At least get down here and see if it's comfortable."

He heard Derek let out a sigh, but he ended up lying on the bed beside him, staring up at the ceiling. "How long do I have to do this for?"

Human touch. Okay. "Alright, so here's an important rule for what we're doing here. You have to keep into consideration everything that I say and not just blow it off because it's different. Otherwise, that sales associate with the clipboard over there? I'm going to make a sign out of whatever paper she's got there saying Human in capital letters and wave it around like a flag."

"Fine. I'm still not getting a circular bed."

Stiles ignored him. Derek had probably never redecorated since he lost his family. He was probably still clinging to the small things that reminded him of them. He hadn't chosen to get a new place, and even though it sucked and it wasn't fair, maybe it was a good thing that the world forced him to try and move on.

If it hadn't happened, they wouldn't be here right now. Derek would have lived an entire lifetime with the barebone structures of his burned down house.

They stayed there still for a couple of moments before he spoke. "You know, when my mom died, my dad had this thing for like a month after the funeral, where he wouldn't move any of her things. They were exactly the way that she left them- there was an empty cup of coffee that had her lipstick stain on it for months, and sometimes after his shift when he tucked me into bed, I would slip out, and I'd see him in the kitchen staring at the lipstick. He slept on the couch because he wasn't ready to go into his bedroom yet."

Stiles kept looking at the ceiling, because he wasn't sure that he would be able to look at Derek giving him the face that people always did whenever they found out that his mother had died. The sad, pitiful face followed by the profuse apologies. "It took him a long time to be able to wash a cup, and it took even longer than that for him to put all of her things in boxes. He still hasn't gotten rid of them. But he was able to move on as much as he could because he figured out that even though to him, that coffee mug isn't just a mug, buying a new one won't replace the memories. And that starting over doesn't mean that the people that aren't there any more never existed, because they did. And that is one thing that the hunters in the world can't take away from you."

He finally tilted his head to the side and looked at Derek, but he didn't give Stiles the look that everyone else did. Derek was listening. He was taking Stiles seriously and looking past the part of the conversation that dealt with his mom.

It was a first, and it was starting to make Stiles feel uncomfortable. He launched his body off the bed and picked himself up off of the floor, straightening out his clothes. "We're not leaving here until you find something. And at this rate, we might as well start living here. Come on, pick something that you like."

Derek got up too, and they stood there awkwardly for five minutes in the middle of the store. Sales associates came by, asking if they needed help, but Stiles shook his head and let them continue walking. He wanted Derek to suggest something.

Stiles waited until Derek walked over to a gray velvet couch tentatively and pointed at it. "This one. In black."

"Try it out", Stiles instructed.

Derek sat down, but Stiles could see the tenseness in his shoulders. "It's comfortable."

"You sound convincing, but you don't look it." Stiles crossed his arms. "Look, it's going to be an extension of your place. Let's say that there's a group of people watching TV- would they be comfortable? Or if someone accidentally fell asleep on it? Would they wake up with their backs hurting? Test it out, see if you could imagine it."

Derek shifted to the side and stretched his legs out on the sofa. "I doubt anyone would be doing that, but I think it'd be okay."

Stiles looked at the label on the arm of the sofa. "It comes with a bed. That could be handy."

"I have guest bedrooms."

It could still come in handy for people who weren't part of his pack but were around him. "You never know." He called over the sales associate and asked her if she could show him the other colors available. She handed him a couple of pages with a variety of colors, and Stiles kneeled to Derek's level on the couch and held them above his head. "Choose one of these. I'm not letting you pick black for everything."

"I like black."

"Well, I think you need more color in your life", Stiles told him. "And besides, the place isn't just for you. It's for everyone."

Derek didn't argue, he just flipped through the pages until he picked a navy blue. It was close enough to be black, but it was still a color. Stiles would take what he could get.

"Okay, so that's one big item right there. We'll get a loveseat that's from this collection too- it'll be the same, just smaller."

"So we can get out of here?" Derek asked hopefully

"Human touch says that if you want do this all in one go, we have to still look around. If you want to come back another day, we can."

Stiles was half-convinced that Derek wanted to just get it out of the way so that he wouldn't have to deal with him anymore.

"Let's come back tomorrow."

They sat at a million tables and visited twenty different stores before they found one that Derek liked. Through all of these trips, Stiles learned something about him- he couldn't be forced to like something. If there was something that he didn't like, it wasn't going home with him, but if he liked something, he didn't need to compare it to a dozen other items to make sure it was what he wanted.

Meanwhile, Stiles was looking at different colleges and making lists comparing them, and seeing whether he wanted to stay home or study somewhere else, what he could afford, the chances of him getting an academic scholarship, and trying to do more SAT questions to boost his confidence and his score when he took the exam for real.

Two weeks later, Derek texted him and said that he was waiting outside. Stiles wanted to shop for things that both decorated the loft and were functional. Things to spruce up the place so it wouldn't look plain. Derek didn't understand the idea, but he was going with it.

Stiles locked the front door and turned around to see a Toyota. Derek was driving a mom-van.

"What the hell is this?" He asked, getting into the car.

Derek shifted the car into reverse and pulled out. There was more anger in his face than usual, more force in his hands as he shifted. "Alphas trashed the Camaro."

"Where is it now?" Stiles asked as Derek started to drive forward.

"The house."

Derek still didn't refer to his new loft as his house or his home. Alphas trashing his sister's car wasn't going to help things.

"I'm sorry, man. If you don't feel up to it, we can always do this tomorrow", Stiles told him.

"Why would we do that?" Derek asked. He kept driving. "What are we looking for again?"

Stiles was a little angry that Derek brushed him off, but didn't bring it up. "Things that personalize your loft."

Derek slowed down at a red light. "I thought that was what everything else did."

"No, those things make it seem like someone actually lives there instead of it being an empty space or a storage unit."

The light turned green and Derek made a sharp left turn. "Right."

Stiles want sure if he wanted to be here with Derek for this right now. It seemed like it would be a better idea to sit somewhere and talk about what was going on with the Alphas, plan some sort of retaliation, not furniture shopping.

He didn't think that this particular level of brooding was good for opening this mind.

"I know how much that car meant to you", Stiles started as they pulled into the parking lot. "I'm sorry."

Derek turned Into the first space he saw. "It was just a car."

"I think you need a floor lamp upstairs. Especially if you're going to turn it into a command center."

"It's not like there isn't a light there."

"Yeah, a really dim light. Cave lighting", Stiles settled on. "You have cave lighting."

"I can see fine up there." Derek grumbled. "Look at how many arms it has- it looks like a sideways menorah."

Stiles looked at the lamp that Derek was pointing at and tilted his head to the left. It really did look like a sideways menorah.

"It does". He affirmed. "And it's awesome. You're getting it."

"We don't need it."

"It's a command center, right?"

"Potential command center, yes."

Stiles crossed his arms. "And who would be running it the majority of the time? For research, or for getting the security system online?:

"Computers have screens that light up."

"And that huge blueprint of Beacon Hills that we've been glued to for the past week? The one spread out on the table? You want me to use a flashlight to see it when the sun goes down?" Stiles tilted his head to the side, and pretended to think. "Wouldn't it be better if we had something that was like a flashlight but bigger? So that I could use both of my hands? Wait, that'd be a lamp."

He was trying to make Derek feel better, tried to make him laugh or even chuckle. It wasn't working, and for a split second, Stiles expected him to say that the lamp would be something reflecting Stiles' personality rather than his own. Instead, Derek scowled at him like he just lost the battle, and sighed. "Pick one that fits in with the rest of the room."

"Excellent."

They placed an order for a lamp that was a color that both of them liked but was out of stock, and Derek dropped Stiles off at his house so that he could do some more SAT practice questions. He went through a stack of flashcards twice before driving over to Derek's old house.

He wasn't sure what compelled him to do it, but he knew where he would find the key. There was another spiral of wolfsbane near where he found the first one, and at the end of the vine, there was a keyring.

The Camaro looked like a crushed soda can from the outside, but when Stiles opened it up to look around, all of the parts inside were in good condition. If he took it to a shop, they'd tell him that it since it was an older model with a lot of miles on it and it was damaged on the inside, it would cost a lot of money for labor to fix it than it would cost to sell it.

He drove the Camaro back to his house and hid it in the garage. A couple of days later, he showed up at Derek's old house with a can of red paint and covered over the symbol of the Alphas on the door.

The week before school started, Stiles was at Derek's loft, lying on the blue velvet couch and typing on his laptop. "So you're telling me that you've heard of his name before?" He asked, trying to figure out what it meant.

"It's familiar, I don't know. I remember hearing it, but I don't know where I heard it from."

"Well, I'm getting things from Greek Mythology, saying that Deucalion was the son of Prometheus. He casted stones that became men. But I'm not seeing anything about Alpha werewolf leaders. Are you sure it's not just something you heard from school?"

Derek nodded. "I'm sure."

Which meant that someone in his family was talking about Deucalion. Maybe Derek was just a child, maybe he's been blocking out his past since the fire. But it meant that if anyone knew for sure what it was about, it was probably Peter.

He sat up and put the laptop on the coffee table. "We're going to have to ask Peter about it if you can't remember. It could be important. It could help."

"The only reason he comes with us is because we need extra people. It doesn't mean that I trust him, or that I've forgive him for what he did."

"Then use him for what he can do for you", Stiles said as his phone rang. He let it ring once or twice before putting his hand in his pocket and pulling it out. It was Scott. "Scott", he greeted, watching Dererk walk away and staring at the two closed doors up the stairs, like he always did.

He listened to Scott telling him about how excited he was that he passed all of his summer classes, and congratulated him. Stiles agreed to go along with Scott to get a tattoo sometime this week, even though he thought it was a weird way to reward himself- hey, I did a good job, let me now stab myself with a needle a million times as a reward.

He probably should have put more effort into talking Scott out of it, but he had been looking at the way Derek was staring at the doors. Derek wasn't staring at it because he was trying to hide that he was listening to the conversation. He wasn't doing it because he was looking for attention, he was just looking at it, like if he stared at it long enough, the doors would open and they would come out of them.

It was one thing to think that members of his pack had run out on him, it was another thing to find out that they had been kidnapped by a pack of Alphas in the process. Derek was taking it hard- Stiles caught him staring at the doors multiple times in a day.

It was Stiles' fault. He thought that it would be a good idea if Isaac chose the stuff in his room, and while Isaac thought that it was unnecessary, that he was glad to just have a room again, Stiles kept pushing.

He wanted Isaac to feel at home because he knew that Derek wanted it too. And while he had a feeling that Isaac was just thankful that he was getting physically abused every day, Stiles wanted Isaac to feel like it was okay to ask for more than that.

Isaac was helping them decide where the washer and dryer should go a week later when Stiles brought it up again, this time in front of Derek. Isaac was plugging it in the back, and had frozen in place for a split second before standing upright again.

"What do you think, Derek?" He asked

Derek had just shrugged. "You want me to do it?"

"No", Isaac decided quickly. "I'll do it. I want to do it."

The room had a bed and sheets that Isaac picked out, along with a desk and drawers for his things. It was simple, but it was what he wanted.

Stiles walked past the other two rooms a couple of weeks later, and opened the doors. The rooms were fully decorated. The first one was blue, and the second one was red and black. Stiles never went shopping with Derek to finish those rooms.

"How much have you told Scott about what's happening?" Derek asked Stiles when he ended the call with Scott and slipped his phone back into his pocket.

"Nothing", Stiles answered. "He's been focusing on his summer classes, you know? If I add this stuff, he'll never graduate, and I don't want that."

Derek nodded, crossing his arms. "You don't have to stay here and help me. You and Isaac, you should go and enjoy being teenagers."

Stiles picked the laptop up again and continued his search on Deucalion, the Alpha baddie that seemed to be in charge of everyone else. "I am."

It's funny how quickly things start at Beacon Hills, especially when school is about to start again. Like summer and winter breaks are the universe's way of letting someone cool off before things are about to go to hell again. A summer of trying to find Derek's missing pack-members and buying furniture on the side and suddenly, everything gets accelerated with a tattoo and a freak car accident.

The one night that Stiles isn't there to help out with things on Derek's side and suddenly, Isaac goes off the grid. He notices that Isaac's not there in English class when he should be, since he compared schedules with him when they got them. That day was important, because he remembered noticing that Isaac's new permanent address was Derek's loft.

He sent Derek a text before class started to let him know that Isaac wasn't there. Derek was never big on long text responses and he wasn't very good at promptly sending them back, but when there was something wrong, he always acted. He was either there in person, demanding to know what was going on, or on the job searching for answers, either by himself or with others.

This time, Stiles was to blame. His English teacher made them turn off their cellphones, and he missed a phone call from Derek, saying that Isaac was in the hospital and it looked like the Alphas did something to him.

Maybe that was the first offense, the first strike. Stiles is too focused on what's going on with the animals in this town. He's looking for answers right away because that's his instinct. Lydia and Allison are back in their lives now, and even though he shouldn't, he practically leaps across his desk to protect Lydia. The emotions for her come back like a zap of static electricity, but he's been trying to stop shuffling his feet. He's been trying to avoid it and trying to get answers.

But something happens when he's finally able to leave the school and turn his phone back on. He had a new voicemail message from Derek, and speeds to his old house right away. He put two and two together before when Scott's Mom called the school and got him out of class- Scott was there too.

Missing the call and not being there must have been the first strike. Maybe Derek felt like a failure for not getting to the hospital in time and forcing Mrs. McCall to get Scott involved again. All he knows is that when Derek is filling Scott in and telling him about what they've been doing all summer, he doesn't mention Stiles' name.

He mentions himself, Peter, and Isaac and leaves Stiles out of it. He didn't correct Scott when he asked why Derek painted the door, but he tried to stop him from doing it. Scott leaves, and Stiles goes with him.

"I'm sorry he forced you to tell him what was going on. It wasn't your fault", he told Derek at the door the day after school started. "And I'm sorry that I didn't answer your call. You called to tell me that Isaac was in the hospital, didn't you?"

"I didn't want you to worry about him", Derek answered. "He's safe. I think he might have seen something, a memory that the Alphas took away. Peter might be able to tap into it."

"I thought you didn't trust Peter farther than you could throw him", Stiles mentioned.

Derek was silent for a moment before answering. "I don't trust myself to be able to do it. I could kill him if I do it wrong."

"And Peter won't?"

"Peter knows I'll kill him if he does."

"Well, that's healthy", Stiles remarked. "Seriously. This whole I kill you, you kill me thing. I feel welcome and warm all over."

"Shouldn't you head home and do your homework?" Derek asked "Spend time with your father?"

"What, no hug and kiss before I go? Maybe during Sideways Chanukah."

"Not a real holiday", Derek told him.

"Oh, Derek", Stiles patted him on the back twice before bending down and picking up his backpack, slinging it over one shoulder. "Anything with presents is a holiday."

The next day, he defended Allison in front of Derek to make her feel better when they came up with a bruise that looked like it could have been something. Maybe that was his second offense, because later that night, he assumed that Derek wanted him to come along to the bank vault. He was used to coming along with his map, and waiting in the car, checking off points that were clear.

But this time, he chose Scott instead, leaving Stiles behind in the loft to wait with Peter, who didn't wasn't interested in suicide missions, even though he was perfectly okay with it all summer long.

Peter was okay with just sleeping on the couch while Stiles was terrified, trying to pull up old security camera footage from the bank vault that had closed down, hoping that there was something that he could tap into, something that would tell him that Scott and Derek was alive.

Maybe his third offense was trying to sleep with his best childhood friend on her birthday, and maybe his fourth offense was hanging around Lydia trying to figure it all out, since dead bodies started popping up who weren't killed by werewolves.

It had to be something, because Derek stopped calling, stopped texting, stopped updating him on his life. Or maybe Derek was just so shocked to find another member of his family alive that he didn't feel like he needed to trust anyone outside of his family or pack anymore. Isaac stopped talking to him, Cora never really started a friendship with him, and it's almost like he's in a different supernatural world now, with druids instead of werewolves.

All he knows is that in between the full moon and right now where he's standing, things are confusing. He has no idea why his English teacher was in this loft, no idea why Derek was alive and he was the last one to know. He doesn't know where the hell Peter is, doesn't know which room Cora is sleeping in, and didn't know until this morning that Isaac wasn't living here anymore.

Things had gone from potentially okay to hell for Derek, and Stiles had no idea. He didn't know what to say, didn't know what he could say to make this better. It's a common phrase that time heals all wounds, but Stiles knows from experience that it's the biggest lie in the world.

All time did was pass, all it did was mean that the rest of the planet kept going, kept spinning, and the people in it kept going with the rest of their lives. Physical dead bodies are only replaced by horrible images in the mind.

All Stiles knew was that he was having a conversation with Boyd only a couple of days ago about how they weren't actually friends, and now, Stiles didn't have any more time to fix it. He didn't have time to prove to Boyd that he didn't have any more friends, he didn't get the chance to show him the bedroom that Derek fixed up for him.

Boyd felt like he had been alone all his life, stayed in a foster home with people who hadn't even noticed that he was missing, and Stiles never got a chance to show him that he had a place here, a family. The doors that Derek kept staring at never had the chance to be opened.

The Alphas had left, Ms. Blake and Lydia left, and Cora had left him to take care of the body. Derek and Stiles were still here, had been in the same position for an hour. Derek was still on his knees, hands trembling uncontrollably, and Stiles was still here, ignoring the vibrations that his phone was making, probably from Scott and his father.

He didn't care about the phone calls right now, he didn't care about the exams that he had tomorrow. All he cared about was trying to offer some form of support to Derek. He didn't have a clue as to what he should say right now- all he knew was that instinct was telling him to get Derek out of the water and into some dry clothes, even if werewolves didn't get sick.

Stiles kept his hand on Derek's shoulder, but walked around him, getting down on his knees to get to his level. He looked in more pain from the front. His eyes were glossed over, he hadn't even registered that Stiles had moved, looked right through him.

He wanted to crack a joke, to break the silence somehow, but he knew that it wouldn't help. He put both of his hands on his arms, trying to get Derek to respond. "You can't stay here forever", he said gently. "I'm going to pull you up in a second, okay? We're going to go upstairs, get you in some dry clothes."

There was no answer. "Derek?"

He was really hoping that Derek would hear him, that he would cooperate with Stiles in getting up. But this was okay too, it wasn't the first time he had to drag him around.

Stiles moved his hands from Derek's arms to his shaking hands and grabbed them, holding them for a couple of seconds to steady them. Something must have snapped inside of Derek, because he pulled his hands back quickly, like he was terrified of himself.

Stiles grabbed Derek's hands again and tugged him forward, pulling him to his feet and putting an arm around his shoulder. "Come on."

"What are you doing here?"

"Getting some swimming in", Stiles grumbled, heading towards the staircase. "We're getting you dried off."

"They should have stayed in school", Derek mumbled. "You should go to school."

They?

"I'm not going anywhere", Stiles told him as they took the first step. "Besides, we spend too much time at that place. Seriously. Scott told me you guys were there during the last full moon, and you- you've already graduated! Not to mention the hours we spend there after school for cross-country and lacrosse. They should give us an award or something. Like when they give out perfect attendance. Most logged hours at school. It could be something."

"Your Dad will worry about you."

"Let me deal with that later. It'll be fine", Stiles assured him.

"You should spend time with him while you have it", Derek said as they reached the top, detaching himself from Stiles' support. "You don't have to be here. I'm fine."

"I'm not going anywhere", Stiles repeated. "We're going to get you in some dry clothes and then you're going to get some sleep."

"Cora needs to start staying with Peter and you need to get back home", he heard Derek mutter as he walked in front of Stiles and into his room.

They bought drawers and hangers for Derek's clothes, but it looked like he hadn't been using there. Stiles threw him a nearby towel and started searching through the clothes while Derek scrubbed his hair dry.

"I'm not even going to start with how much of a bad idea that is", Stiles told him, holding out a shirt that had a giant hole through the center on both sides and a stain of blood surrounding it. "You can't wear this", he said, sighing. "It's like a crime scene in here. They'll handcuff you just looking at this."

"Don't worry, it's my blood."

Stiles let out a laugh, asking himself what happened to make Derek think that his blood being on this was going to make him worry less.

The next shirt that he grabbed was covered in blood and was ripped to shreds. "Why do you still have this?" Stiles asked

Derek shrugged. "It's from the last full-moon."

Scott said that they found Derek next to Cora and Boyd's sleeping bodies, that they had been slashing at him for hours because there was a third heartbeat in the boiler room that shouldn't have been there.

When did all of Stiles' information about Derek start coming from Scott and Isaac? Why hadn't they said anything? Why was this shirt still here?

"So you're keeping it like a collectable? You can't wear it, it's more like a general shape of a shirt instead of an actual piece of clothing, and you haven't even washed it."

Derek gave him a sad look. "Go home, Stiles. I'll take care of it."

Stiles ignored him and kept looking through his clothes before finally pulling up a black wife beater and feeling it for hardened blood stains. When he couldn't feel anything, he tossed it to Derek, who caught it and threw the towel on the bed. "Put this on."

Derek turned from him and took the dripping shirt off, letting it drop to the floor, revealing the triskelion tattoo on his back. Things of three. It might have started out as Alphas, Betas, and Omegas, but it wasn't like that anymore.

It was Isaac, Erica, and Boyd, and two out of the three were dead.

"Take your shoes, socks, and jeans off too." He instructed Derek.

Derek slipped his shoes and socks off as he dried off his damp torso and arms, pulling on the wife beater. Stiles found a pair of sweatpants lying around, and threw it in Derek's general direction, rolling his eyes at how unfair it was that Derek looked this attractive, even in this state.

Stiles slipped out of his own shoes and socks, and sat on the bed. "And you're going to sleep here, and I'll be here for whatever you need."

"Your father is going to worry if you don't come home."

He took out his cell phone, and dangling it between his fingers to show it to Derek. He typed a quick text to his father, saying that he had a friend that needed him, and he wouldn't be home tonight, before turning it off and slipping it back in his pocket. "Crisis averted."

"I don't need you here", Derek insisted.

"I'm not going to change my mind."

"Every second that you stay here, you're risking your life. You need to leave. Now."

Stiles got up from the bed, grabbed Derek's shoulders, and spun him around towards the bed before pushing him down. He sat down himself and pulled Derek close to him. "You're not going to hurt me. This isn't your fault."

"He should have healed, I don't understand", Derek muttered.

"You didn't kill him", Stiles told him firmly. "The Alphas did. It wasn't your fault."

"I tried so hard on the full moon to save him, to make sure that I wouldn't kill him."

"I know you did." Stiles rubbed his hand up and down his back, looking at the discarded shirt in the corner. "I know."

Stiles woke up the next morning in Derek's bed alone. He went downstairs and the water was still there. He called out for Derek, but nobody replied. Cora wasn't in the place either, and he didn't know her well enough to figure out where she went.

He waited for Derek to come back for an hour before he left for school. He was distracted and didn't want to speak to anyone. He didn't want to deal with the awkwardness that was going to be English class, so he left the school before fourth period, and let himself into Derek's loft. Nobody was there.

Stiles bought a pond vacuum and sucked up all of the water. All of the furniture was destroyed on this floor, the tables that they spent hours picking out, the blue velvet couch that turned into a bed- all of it was damaged beyond repair. He called multiple stores, trying to see if it could be replaced under warranty, but they all asked him how it got to be so badly water damaged, and he couldn't explain it.

He visited the loft every day, and other the third day, Cora showed up as he was trying to put together a table. She told him that it was hopeless, and that she didn't know where Derek was. He asked her if she was being purposefully unhelpful, and she told him that they didn't check up on each other. It wasn't a thing that they did.

When three days turned into a week, Stiles started getting worried. He started looking around the forest for him, started asking store owners in the town if they had seen, tall, dark, and brooding, but they hadn't. He searched for hours until he checked Derek's old house and found him staring at the clawed out door.

Derek was surrounded by empty bottles of everclear, but he didn't look like he was drunk. Just self-punishing.

"I've been looking for you", Stiles said, pushing some of the bottles out of the way to make room to sit down on the floor beside him. "You turned off your phone, nobody's seen you."

"It's dead."

"Are you going to go back to your loft? It's not covered in water anymore."

"There's no point." Derek's voice was rough.

"Why would you think that?" Stiles asked

"You painted the door, didn't you?" Derek asked suddenly

Stiles had been looking for some form of acknowledgement from him for months, an indication that their summer of getting closer and being friends, their summer of Derek actually trusting him existed. He wished that it was under better circumstances.

"Yes."

Derek pointed at the door. "That's why."

"Because Scott decided that werewolf anger-management was best done on your door?"

"No", Derek sighed. "Because I did everything that you told me to. I bought an apartment so we wouldn't have to live in a train-car. I bought the couch, personalized everything, got the lamp so there's light, bought beds so that we wouldn't have to sleep on the floor, bought new mattresses and tables, I cleaned the windows, and I bought a stove so we could cook on it. I looked for months for them, and it all went to shit anyway."

Stiles was looking at the door too. That stupid symbol was on the window of the loft too- it took him an hour yesterday to scrub it all off.

He didn't like to think that he was capable of hatred, but he had never hated the Alphas more than anything else in his life. "No it didn't. You changed, Derek. You were getting better, and things can get better again."

"I can't keep doing this."

Stiles looked around at the empty bottles and wondered if Derek was maybe a little drunk after all, if he was talking like this. "Doing what?"

"Changing people just to have them die. I gave them this life- maybe I was wrong about the bite. Maybe it's poison instead of a gift."

"You saved them", Stiles said simply.

Derek let out a bitter laugh. "Did I? They all would be alive if they hadn't gotten involved in this. With me. You know, Boyd said that it was worth it? It was one of the last things he said to me."

"Boyd knew exactly what he was getting into when he accepted the bite", Stiles told him. "You explained it to all of them, and they accepted it. You told them that there was a chance that they wouldn't survive the bite, and they took the chance anyway. This isn't your fault. This is Deucalion's fault, this is Kali's fault. Not yours."

Derek was silent for a moment, and Stiles stared at him, waiting for him to say something. A tear rolled down Derek's eye instead, and he leaned his head against the wall. "I never told them how much I cared about them. I just kept training them, pushing them harder. Cranking spikes in their skulls to control them during the full moon. Hurting them."

"Derek, look at me. They knew."

He shook his head. "You don't know that."

"You gave them life again. All Boyd wanted was to be a part of something. All Erica was looking for was health and to be wanted. And you gave Isaac a stable environment- he's been happier than I've seen in a long time. He's not walking around, hoping to be as invisible as possible. He's okay."

"I kicked him out of the apartment. I threw a glass at him on a day where he had been trapped in a janitor's closet and lost control."

"Why did you do that?" Stiles asked "Why was the glass important?"

"The Alphas told me that I was going to kill one of my own pack. I wanted to protect him, I didn't ask Boyd to move into his room. The night Isaac's father died", Derek stopped for a moment before continuing. "He threw a glass at him. A shard of it almost hit him in the eye. He didn't listen to me telling him to move out. It was the only thing I could think of that would make him hate me enough to leave."

"And he still came back with Boyd to protect you."

"I wanted to protect them so badly. And one of them died anyway. Nothing is working. Isaac and Cora are going to die next, and there's nothing that I can do to stop it. And Peter will manage to outlive us all."

"The Alphas got what they wanted. I think Cora and Isaac are going to be okay. You know, Isaac's staying with Scott now?"

"Scott can protect them better than I can."

"Scott's not as put together as you might think", Stiles mentioned, thinking about the cross-country meet that never happened. "And as much as you won't admit it when you're sober, I know how much you cared for them, how much you still care. And even though you never said it, they knew how much you loved them."

"And how's that?"

"I can see it in your eyes", Stiles began. "They knew you were tough on them because you wanted them to live, and they wouldn't have come back to protect you if they didn't love you too."

Derek didn't say anything for a long time. They sat there in the burned down remnants of Derek's old home, and Stiles thought of how far Derek had come from being here, from looking at him with a stone face and telling him and Scott to leave, that it was private property.

Stiles remembered how proud of him he was for buying a loft, for decorating it and putting his mark on something. All of Derek's things used to be shoved in a duffel bag in the corner of some place that a normal human could contract tetanus in if they stuck around too long. Stiles always thought that Derek would just up and leave one day if it got to be too much.

Derek wouldn't have recruited Stiles to give his new place a human touch if he hadn't been really trying. It wasn't fair that Derek had to go through any of this. He lost his family, he lost his house, and now parts of his pack were dropping dead.

He didn't want Derek to think that this place was the best it could get for him, that it was what he deserved. He didn't want to see the last bit of hope that Derek had dwindle until it was finally extinguished.

Stiles got up, and held out his hand. "Come with me, I want to show you something."

Derek gave him a confused look, but took his hand and accepted the assistance. Stiles moved some bottles aside with his foot, causing clinking noises as he created a path, and they walked out of the house and into the Jeep.

"Where we going?" Derek asked

"To a magical place with faeries and rainbows", Stiles said sarcastically, starting the car.

"I don't want to go back to my apartment", Derek told him.

"Well, that's fine, since we're not going there. At least not right now, anyway." Stiles reversed onto the dirt road and shifted gears. "I understand if you want to move into a new place, but you'll eventually have to go back to get your things. Like I said before, it's not covered in water anymore."

"You didn't have to do that."

"I was bored, it was there. Don't worry about it."

"I buried both of them at the house", Derek explained. "Packs stay together, even in death."

"You should have called me before hurting yourself with wolfsbane", Stiles said, irritated. "You should have called me about a lot of things."

"I was outside of the school for four hours, waiting for someone", Derek snapped at him. "Nobody showed up."

"I have this new-agey thing, Derek, that allows people to communicate with me at any time of the day, no matter where I am. It's called a cellphone. That thing in your pocket with a dead battery."

Derek was silent.

"A mass-text would have worked", Stiles went on. "Just a 'hey, I'm not dead.' That would have been great to know. But that doesn't matter now."

"I didn't want anyone else getting hurt."

"Well, I'm still here, aren't I?" Stiles asked, pulling into the driveway. "Anyway, we're here."

"At your house?"

Stiles turned off the ignition. "You have been here before, you know. Come on."

They got out of the car and Stiles took out the key to the garage. He pushed open the door and turned on the light. The Camaro looked brand new.

He looked at Derek, studying his reaction. It was the first time that Derek looked truly stunned and happy. "How did you...?"

"I found the keys, brought it home with me, worked on it over the summer."

"Why?" Derek asked

"Do you remember when we started furnishing everything and I told you that story about my Dad and the lipstick on the mug?" Derek nodded. "You washed the mug. You put it away, and the memories are always going to be there. I didn't want you to feel like the Alphas could go ahead and get away with crashing the mug and breaking it into pieces. I know that when you care about something and put effort into it, it hurts even more when it's broken or lost. But you have to keep fighting, keep trying."

"It's not my car", Derek mustered. "It's Laura's- it was her graduation present from my parents."

Stiles nodded. "I know. It's registered to her. You never changed it."

"It's Laura's." Derek repeated.

Stiles walked over to a nearby tool box, pulled open a drawer, and retrieved the keys before closing the drawer again. "It doesn't make you a bad person to be happy for a couple of minutes", he told Derek, putting the keys in his hands. "Do you want to give it a try?"

Derek unlocked the car and sat in the driver's seat. He put the key in the ignition and the engine roared to life. Stiles watched the automatic smile plaster on his face as he put a hand on the wheel. He walked over to the window, and Derek rolled it down. "How does everything look and sound?"

"Like it's new. When were you going to tell me about this?"

Stiles crossed his arms and smirked. "Happy Sideways Chanukah, Derek."


End file.
